In this newsletter, you will find books releasing the weeks of November 28th and December 5th that we think will be of interest to Bookreporter.com readers, along with Bonus News, where we call out a contest, feature or review that we want to let you know about so you have it on your radar.
This week, we are calling attention to our VERY special contest on ReadingGroupGuides.com, where we are giving readers the opportunity to share their favorite book that they read with their group and their favorite book that they read outside their group this year.
One Grand Prize winner will receive SIX outstanding book group titles releasing next year: CODE NAME SAPPHIRE by Pam Jenoff, HELLO BEAUTIFUL by Ann Napolitano, THE HOUSE OF EVE by Sadeqa Johnson, LOYALTY by Lisa Scottoline, THE MITFORD AFFAIR by Marie Benedict, and MOONRISE OVER NEW JESSUP by Jamila Minnicks. Be sure to enter by Wednesday, January 11th at noon ET.
This is your last newsletter reminder to sign up for this month’s “Bookaccino Live” Book Group event, which will take place TOMORROW, Wednesday, November 30th at 8pm ET.
Our guest will be Charmaine Wilkerson, and we will be talking about her debut novel, BLACK CAKE, a Bookreporter.com Bets On pick that is now available in paperback. Our reviewer Rebecca Munro calls the book “a riveting and moving second-chance novel about a fractured family and the lore that brings them back together one last time… [M]uch like the recipe at the heart of the story, BLACK CAKE is deep, rich and best savored as a special treat.”
You can register for the event by clicking here. If you would like to ask Charmaine a question on camera during the event and chat with her in our “backstage green room” before the event, please email Carol with your question using the subject line “Black Cake” by Wednesday at noon ET. Those who are camera shy can send their questions via the Q&A feature on Zoom.
This also is your last “On Sale This Week” newsletter reminder to sign up for our special “Bookaccino Live” evening event, which will take place next Tuesday, December 6th at 8pm ET.
We will be talking to 13 Bookreporter reviewers about their top three books of 2022. Our guests will be Kate Ayers, Sarah Rachel Egelman, Megan Elliott, Harvey Freedenberg, Ron Kaplan, Pamela Kramer, Bronwyn Miller, Rebecca Munro, Eileen Zimmerman Nicol, Ray Palen, Norah Piehl, Stuart Shiffman and Jana Siciliano. Click here to register for the event. We are so looking forward to finding out which books they have selected and why.
For those of you who are doing online shopping, if you use the store links below, Bookreporter.com gets a small affiliate fee on your purchases. We would appreciate your considering this!
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indiebound
Upcoming Virtual Book and Author Events
As many book and author events are still happening online these days, we are highlighting a number of them that you may be interested in attending. Click on the links below for more info and to register.
Wednesday, November 30th at 7pm ET: "Friends and Fiction": The "Friends and Fiction" authors --- Mary Kay Andrews, Kristin Harmel, Kristy Woodson Harvey and Patti Callahan Henry --- will talk to Kevin Wilson about his new book, NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO PANIC. Appearing on the Aftershow will be Sheila Roberts, whose latest novel is THE ROAD TO CHRISTMAS.
Wednesday, November 30th at 8pm ET: "Bookaccino Live" Book Group: Carol Fitzgerald will talk to Charmaine Wilkerson about her debut novel, BLACK CAKE. Charmaine also will answer questions from guests who will be "on stage," as well as from other members of the audience. If you would like to be one of our featured audience guests and ask Charmaine a question on camera, please send Carol an email with the subject line “Black Cake” by Wednesday the 30th at noon ET.
Monday, December 5th at 7pm ET: Barnes & Noble: Join Barnes & Noble as they welcome #1 New York Times bestselling author Louise Penny for a live virtual event to discuss A WORLD OF CURIOSITIES, the 18th spellbinding novel in her beloved series, featuring the return of Chief Inspector Armand Gamache. She will be in conversation with Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Monday, December 5th at 7pm ET: The Poisoned Pen Bookstore: Jeff Lindsay will talk about his new novel, THREE-EDGED SWORD, the third installment in his wickedly funny, wildly twisty series starring super thief Riley Wolfe.
Monday, December 5th at 7:30pm ET: “Lisa Live!”: Join Lisa Scottoline every Monday night as she hosts her weekly “Talking LOYALTY” video series and Facebook Live events leading up to the publication of her historical novel, LOYALTY, on March 28, 2023. And be sure to enter the LOYALTY Pre-order Sweepstakes!
Monday, December 5th at 8:30pm ET: The Poisoned Pen Bookstore: Richard Paul Evans will talk about his latest book, A CHRISTMAS MEMORY, a poignant, deeply felt novel about loss, grief, the healing power of forgiveness, and the true meaning of the holiday season.
Tuesday, December 6th at 3pm ET: Barnes & Noble Book Club: Join Barnes & Noble as they welcome Katy Hays for a live virtual event to discuss THE CLOISTERS, November's B&N Book Club pick. She will be in conversation with Shannon DeVito, the Director of Category Management at B&N, and Miwa Messer, B&N’s Editorial Director.
Tuesday, December 6th at 3pm ET: The Poisoned Pen Bookstore: Peter Lovesey will talk about his new mystery, SHOWSTOPPER. The cast and crew of a hit British TV show are rumored to be cursed. But are these spooky deaths coincidences or murder? It's up to Bath detective Peter Diamond to find out.
Tuesday, December 6th at 8pm ET: "Bookaccino Live" Reviewer Event: Join us for a special “Bookaccino Live” evening event as 13 Bookreporter reviewers will be talking about their favorite books of 2022. Our guests will be Kate Ayers, Sarah Rachel Egelman, Megan Elliott, Harvey Freedenberg, Ron Kaplan, Pamela Kramer, Bronwyn Miller, Rebecca Munro, Eileen Zimmerman Nicol, Ray Palen, Norah Piehl, Stuart Shiffman and Jana Siciliano.
This Week's Bonus News:
Special Contest on ReadingGroupGuides.com
Share Your Favorite Books of 2022 and Enter to Win
SIX Outstanding Book Group Titles Releasing in 2023!
This is the time of year when we start seeing “Best Books of the Year” lists. We would like you and your book group to help us compile ours!
All you have to do is fill out the form on this page, sharing both your favorite book that you read with your group and your favorite book that you read outside your group in 2022, by Wednesday, January 11th at noon ET.
One Grand Prize winner will be awarded SIX fabulous book group titles releasing in early 2023:
Please note: Your favorite book that you discussed with your group CAN be the same as your favorite book of the year. And they don't need to have been published in 2022. Also, please be careful with the spelling of book titles and authors’ first and last names to save us editing time.
We will share our reader-compiled "Best Of" list with you shortly after the contest ends. We cannot wait to see what you select!
Click here to share your favorite books of 2022 and enter the contest.
On Sale the Week of November 28th in Hardcover
November 29th
ALL THE BROKEN PLACES by John Boyne (Historical Fiction)
Ninety-one-year-old Gretel Fernsby has lived in the same well-to-do mansion block in London for decades. She doesn’t talk about her escape from Nazi Germany at age 12. She doesn’t talk about the grim post-war years in France with her mother. Most of all, she doesn’t talk about her father, who was the commandant of one of the Reich’s most notorious extermination camps. Then, a new family moves into the apartment below her. In spite of herself, Gretel can’t help but begin a friendship with the little boy, Henry, though his presence brings back memories she would rather forget. One night, she witnesses a disturbing, violent argument between Henry’s beautiful mother and his arrogant father, one that threatens Gretel’s hard-won, self-contained existence.
Pamela Dorman Books | 9780593653067
ALONE WITH YOU IN THE ETHER: A Love Story by Olivie Blake (Romance)
Two people meet in the Art Institute by chance. Prior to their encounter, he is a doctoral student who manages his destructive thoughts with compulsive calculations about time travel; she is a bipolar counterfeit artist, undergoing court-ordered psychotherapy. By the end of the story, these things will still be true. But this is not a story about endings. For Regan and Aldo, life has been a matter of resigning themselves to the blueprints of inevitability --- until the two meet. Could six conversations with a stranger be the variable that shakes up the entire simulation?
Tor Books | 9781250888167
A HEART THAT WORKS by Rob Delaney (Memoir)
In 2016, Rob Delaney’s one-year-old son, Henry, was diagnosed with a brain tumor. The family had moved from Los Angeles to London with their two young boys when Rob’s wife was pregnant with Henry. His illness was a cataclysm that changed everything about their lives. Amid the hospital routine, surgeries and brutal treatments, they found a newfound community of nurses, aides, caregivers and fellow parents contending with the unthinkable. Henry died two years later, and his family watched their world fall away to reveal the things that matter most. A HEART THAT WORKS is Delaney’s intimate, unflinching and fiercely funny exploration of what happened --- from the harrowing illness to the vivid, bodily impact of grief and the blind, furious rage that followed through to the forceful, unstoppable love that remains.
Spiegel & Grau | 9781954118317
A QUIET LIFE by Ethan Joella (Fiction)
Chuck Ayers can’t decide if he should make the annual trip to Hilton Head without his late wife, Cat. Ella Burke works two jobs to make ends meet and fill the hours while she waits for news about her missing daughter. Kirsten Bonato put her aspirations for veterinary school aside after her father’s sudden death and finds comfort working at an animal shelter. These three individuals’ stories intersect in surprising and heartwarming ways as each person discovers how to move forward with their lives.
Scribner | 9781982190972
WINTERLAND by Rae Meadows (Historical Mystery)
Soviet Union, 1973: There is perhaps no greater honor for a young girl than to be chosen for the famed USSR gymnastics program. When eight-year-old Anya is selected, her family is thrilled. What is left of her family, that is. Years ago, her mother disappeared without a trace, leaving Anya’s father devastated and their lives dark and quiet in the bitter cold of Siberia. Anya’s only confidant is her neighbor, an older woman who survived unspeakable horrors during her 10 years imprisoned in a Gulag camp --- and who, unbeknownst to Anya, was also her mother’s confidant and might hold the key to her disappearance. As Anya rises through the ranks of competitive gymnastics, and as other girls fall from grace, she soon comes to realize that there is very little margin of error for anyone and so much to lose.
Henry Holt and Co. | 9781250834522
A WORLD OF CURIOSITIES by Louise Penny (Mystery)
As the villagers of Three Pines prepare for a special celebration, Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and Jean-Guy Beauvoir find themselves increasingly worried. A young man and woman have reappeared in the Sûreté du Québec investigators’ lives after many years. The two were young children when their troubled mother was murdered, leaving them damaged and shattered. Now they’ve arrived in Three Pines. But to what end? Gamache and Beauvoir’s memories of that tragic case, the one that first brought them together, come rushing back. Did their mother’s murder hurt them beyond repair? Have those terrible wounds, buried for decades, festered and are now about to erupt?
Minotaur Books | 9781250145291
On Sale the Week of November 28th in Paperback
November 29th
ANGELS OF THE RESISTANCE: A WWII Novel by Noelle Salazar (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
Netherlands, 1940. As bombs fall across Europe, 14-year-old Lien Vinke fears that the reality of war is inescapable. Though she lives a quiet life with her mother and older sister, Elif, they are no strangers to heartache, having recently suffered an immeasurable loss. And when the Nazis invade the Netherlands, joining the Dutch resistance with Elif offers just the atonement Lien craves. Trained to shoot by their late father, the sisters soon find themselves entrenched in the underground movement. They forge friendships with the other young recruits, and Lien even discovers a kindred spirit in a boy named Charlie. But in wartime, emotional attachments are a liability she can’t afford, especially when a deeply personal mission jeopardizes everything she holds dear.
Mira | 9780778386797
ANTOINETTE’S SISTER by Diana Giovinazzo (Historical Fiction)
Austria, 1767: Maria Carolina Charlotte --- the 10th daughter and one of 16 children of Empress Maria Theresa of Austria --- knows her position as a Habsburg archduchess will inevitably force her to leave her home, family and cherished sister, Antoinette, whose companionship she values over all else. But not yet. The Habsburg family is celebrating a great triumph: Charlotte’s older sister, Josepha, has been promised to King Ferdinand IV of Naples and will soon take her place as queen. Before she can journey to her new home, however, tragedy strikes. After visiting the family crypt, Josepha contracts smallpox and dies. Shocked, Charlotte is forced to face an unthinkable new reality: she now must marry Ferdinand in her sister’s stead.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538720141
APPARENTLY THERE WERE COMPLAINTS: A Memoir by Sharon Gless (Memoir)
Anyone who has seen Sharon Gless act in “Cagney and Lacey,” “Queer as Folk,” “Burn Notice” and countless other shows and movies knows that she’s someone who gives every role her all. She holds nothing back in APPARENTLY THERE WERE COMPLAINTS, which delves into her remarkable career and explores her complicated family, her struggles with alcoholism and her fear of romantic commitment, as well as her encounters with some of Hollywood’s biggest names. Brutally honest and incredibly relatable, Gless puts it all out on the page in the same way she has lived --- never with moderation.
Simon & Schuster | 9781501125966
BLACK CAKE by Charmaine Wilkerson (Fiction)
Eleanor Bennett’s death leaves behind a puzzling inheritance for her two children, Byron and Benny: a traditional Caribbean black cake, made from a family recipe with a long history, and a voice recording. In her message, Eleanor shares a tumultuous story about a headstrong young swimmer who escapes her island home under suspicion of murder. The heartbreaking tale Eleanor unfolds, the secrets she still holds back, and the mystery of a long-lost child challenge everything the siblings thought they knew about their lineage, and themselves. Can Byron and Benny reclaim their once-close relationship, piece together Eleanor’s true history, and fulfill her final request to “share the black cake when the time is right”? Will their mother’s revelations bring them back together or leave them feeling more lost than ever?
Ballantine Books | 9780593358351
BLUE FIRE: A Victoria Emerson Thriller by John Gilstrap (Political Thriller)
One-time congressional representative Victoria Emerson has become the leader of a small town in West Virginia, where it’s a struggle just to provide food and shelter. Progress is encouraging, until one morning her son sounds the alarm “Blue Fire!” --- the code phrase for imminent danger. A renegade band of National Guardsmen wants to take over the town and steal its resources. They have the firepower to eliminate anyone who puts up a fight. But Victoria swore an oath to defend her people. It’s time to tap into the traditional American values of courage, ingenuity and patriotism --- and fight fire with fire.
Pinnacle | 9780786046669
FACTORY GIRLS by Michelle Gallen (Fiction)
Paperback Original
It’s the summer of 1994, and all Maeve Murray wants are good final exam results so she can earn her ticket out of the wee Northern Irish town she has grown up in during the Troubles --- away from her crowded home, the silence and sadness surrounding her sister’s death, and away from the simmering violence of her divided community. And as a first step, Maeve has taken a summer job in a local shirt factory working alongside Protestants with her best friends. But getting the right exam results is only part of Maeve’s problem --- she has to survive a tit-for-tat paramilitary campaign, iron 100 shirts an hour all day every day, and deal with the attentions of Andy Strawbridge, her slick and untrustworthy English boss.
Algonquin Books | 9781643752457
THE FINAL CASE by David Guterson (Literary Thriller)
A girl dies one late, rainy night a few feet from the back door of her home. The girl, Abeba, was born in Ethiopia. Her adoptive parents, Delvin and Betsy Harvey --- conservative, white fundamentalist Christians --- are charged with her murder. Royal, a Seattle criminal attorney in the last days of his long career, takes Betsy Harvey’s case. An octogenarian without a driver’s license, he leans on his son --- the novel’s narrator --- as he prepares for trial.
Vintage | 9780525563112
IN THE BLOOD by Jack Carr (Political Thriller)
A woman boards a plane in the African country of Burkina Faso having just completed a targeted assassination for the state of Israel. Two minutes later, her plane is blown out of the sky. Over 6,000 miles away, former Navy SEAL James Reece watches the names and pictures of the victims on cable news. One face triggers a distant memory of a Mossad operative attached to the CIA years earlier in Iraq --- a woman with ties to the intelligence services of two nations, a woman Reece thought he would never see again. Reece enlists friends new and old across the globe to track down her killer, unaware that he may be walking into a deadly trap.
Pocket Books | 9781982181666
THE NIGHT SHIFT by Alex Finlay (Thriller)
On New Year’s Eve 1999, four teenagers working late at a Blockbuster Video in New Jersey are attacked. Only one inexplicably survives. Police quickly identify a suspect, the boyfriend of one of the victims, who flees and is never seen again. Fifteen years later, more teenage employees are attacked at an ice cream store in the same town, and again only one makes it out alive. In the aftermath of the latest crime, three lives intersect: the lone survivor of the Blockbuster massacre, who’s forced to relive the horrors of her tragedy; the brother of the fugitive accused, who’s convinced the police have the wrong suspect; and FBI agent Sarah Keller, who must delve into the secrets of both nights to uncover the truth about murders on the night shift.
Minotaur Books | 9781250850386
THE PERSONAL ASSISTANT by Kimberly Belle (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
When Alex first began posting unscripted family moments and motivational messages online, she had no intention of becoming an influencer. Overnight it seemed she’d amassed a huge following, and her hobby became a full-time job --- one that was impossible to manage without her sharp-as-a-tack personal assistant, AC. But all the good will of her followers turns toxic when one controversial post goes viral in the worst possible way. Alex reaches out to AC for damage control, but her assistant, whom she trusted with all her secrets, is now missing. As Alex digs into AC’s identity --- and a woman is found murdered --- she’ll find the greatest threat isn’t online, but in her own living room.
Park Row | 9780778333258
A SAFE HOUSE: A Stone Barrington Novel by Stuart Woods (Thriller/Adventure)
Stone Barrington is looking forward to some quiet time in New York City, until he is asked to transport precious, top-secret cargo across the Atlantic. Taking on the challenge, Stone flies off unaware of what --- or who --- he is bringing with him. But his plans to lie low are quickly spoiled when a dangerous dispatcher tracks down Stone and his tantalizing mystery guest, intent on payback --- and silencing anyone who poses a threat. From the English countryside to the balmy beaches of Key West, Stone is on an international mission to hide and protect those closest to him.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons | 9780593331774
SUCH A BEAUTIFUL FAMILY by T.R. Ragan (Psychological Thriller)
Nora Harmon has a lot to be thankful for: two great kids, a stable marriage, and now, a dream career. Software consultant Jane Bell wants Nora on her team. She’s offering a fantastic salary, flexible hours and a chance to travel the world. It sounds too good to be true, but Jane won’t take no for an answer. Jane acts more like a friend than a boss, and Nora’s personal and professional boundaries begin to blur. Jane is smitten with Nora’s perfect family --- particularly her daughter --- and far too attentive to Nora’s husband. Nora can’t help but feel insecure and unsettled. Maybe Jane is everything she says she is: a lonely woman in need of feeling the love of a kind and decent family. Maybe Nora is just being paranoid. Maybe not.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781662500299
TELL ME HOW TO BE by Neel Patel (Fiction)
Paperback Original
As the one-year anniversary of her husband’s death approaches, Renu Amin is binge-watching soap operas and simmering with old resentments. She can’t stop wondering if, 35 years ago, she chose the wrong life. In Los Angeles, her son, Akash, has everything he ever wanted, but as he tries to kickstart his songwriting career and commit to his boyfriend, he is haunted by the painful memories he fled a decade ago. When his mother tells him she is selling the family home, Akash returns to Illinois, hoping to finally say goodbye and move on. But as their pasts catch up to them, Renu and Akash must decide between the lives they left behind and the ones they’ve since created, between making each other happy and setting themselves free.
Flatiron Books | 9781250184986
WHITE ON WHITE by Aysegül Savas (Fiction)
A student moves to the city to research Gothic nudes, renting an apartment from a painter, Agnes, who lives in another town with her husband. One day, Agnes arrives in the city and settles into the upstairs studio. In their meetings, Agnes tells stories of her youth, her family, her marriage and ideas for her art --- which is always just about to be created. As the months pass, it becomes clear that Agnes might not have a place to return to. The student is increasingly aware of Agnes' disintegration. Her stories are frenetic; her art scattered and unfinished, white paint on a white canvas. What emerges is the menacing sense that every life is always at the edge of disaster, no matter its seeming stability.
Riverhead Books | 9780593330524
December 1st
FRANK COSTELLO by Ronald K. Fried (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
As Frank Costello looks back over his life as head of the most powerful crime family in America, he doesn't focus on the triumphs of his bootlegging empire, his nationwide gambling network, or his de facto control of Tammany Hall. Instead, Costello --- the politically connected "Prime Minister of the Underworld" --- remembers the lies he's told, the mistakes he's made, and his fateful decision to testify before the televised Kefauver hearings investigating organized crime in America. The novel reaches its climax as Costello --- in a naïve attempt to preserve the patina of respectability he's spent his life creating --- tries to defend himself before senators out to expose the full extent of the Mafia's reach. The result is a humiliating, very public lesson about who holds the real power in America.
Excelsior Editions | 9781438491141
THE WIDOW by Kaira Rouda (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Jody Asher had a plan. Her charismatic husband, Martin, would be a political icon. For 15 congressional terms, they were the golden couple on the Hill. Life was good. Until it wasn’t. Martin’s secret affair with a young staffer doesn’t bother Jody personally, but professionally it’s a legacy killer. Soon a reporter gets word of this scandal in the making, and Martin’s indiscretions threaten to ruin everything Jody has accomplished. When Martin suddenly dies, it’s a chance to change the narrative --- but the reporter won’t let go of his lead. As the balance of power shifts in the Asher house and on the Hill, it’s time for Jody to take control. There’s nothing the ruthless widow won’t do to secure the future she’s entitled to. Even if she has a secret of her own.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781542039215
On Sale the Week of December 5th in Hardcover
December 6th
ANATOMY OF 55 MORE SONGS: The Oral History of Top Hits That Changed Rock, Pop and Soul by Marc Myers (Music/History)
Songs that sell the most copies become hits, but some of those hits become something more --- iconic recordings that not only inspire a generation but also change the direction of music. In ANATOMY OF 55 MORE SONGS, based on his column for the Wall Street Journal, music journalist and historian Marc Myers tells the story behind 55 rock, pop, R&B, country and soul-gospel hits through intimate interviews with the artists who wrote and recorded them. The book ranges from Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Bad Moon Rising” to Dionne Warwick’s “Walk On By,” The Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations” and Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid.” Through an absorbing, chronological, song-by-song analysis of the most memorable post-war hits, Myers provides a sweeping look at the evolution of pop music between 1964 and today.
Grove Press | 9780802160201
BLOOD, FIRE & GOLD: The Story of Elizabeth I & Catherine de Medici by Estelle Paranque (History)
Sixteenth-century Europe was a hostile world dominated by court politics and patriarchal structures. Yet, against all odds, two women rose to power: Elizabeth I and Catherine de Medici. One a young Virgin Queen who ruled her kingdom alone, and the other a more experienced and clandestine leader who used her children to shape the dynasties of Europe, much has been written about these shrewd and strategic sovereigns. But though their individual legacies have been heavily scrutinized, nothing has been said of their complicated relationship --- 30 years of camaraderie, competition and conflict that forever changed the face of Europe. In BLOOD, FIRE & GOLD, historian Estelle Paranque offers a new way of looking at two of history's most powerful women: through the eyes of the other.
Hachette Books | 9780306830518
BOMBAY MONSOON by James W. Ziskin (Historical Thriller)
The year is 1975. Danny Jacobs is an ambitious, young American journalist who’s just arrived in Bombay for a new assignment. He’s soon caught up in the chaos of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s domestic “Emergency.” Willy Smets is Danny’s enigmatic expat neighbor. He’s a charming man but with suspicious connections. As a monsoon drenches Bombay, Danny falls hard for Sushmita, Smets’ beguiling and clever lover --- and the infatuation is mutual. "The Emergency," a virtual coup by the prime minister, is only the first twist in the high-stakes drama of Danny’s new life in India. The assassination of a police officer by a Marxist extremist, as well as Danny’s obsession with the inscrutable Sushmita, conspire to put his career --- and life --- in jeopardy.
Oceanview Publishing | 9781608095063
BRYANT & MAY: PECULIAR LONDON by Christopher Fowler (Mystery)
It’s getting late. I want to share my knowledge of London with you, if I can remember any of it. So says Arthur Bryant. He and John May are the nation’s oldest serving detectives. Who better to reveal its secrets? Why does this rainy, cold, gray city capture so many imaginations? Could its very unreliability hold the key to its longevity? The detectives are joined by their boss, Raymond Land, and some of their most disreputable friends. Each character gives us a short tour of odd buildings, odder characters, lost venues, forgotten disasters, confusing routes, dubious gossip, illicit pleasures and hidden pubs. They make all sorts of connections --- and show us why it’s almost impossible to separate fact from fiction in London.
Bantam | 9780593356241
A DANGEROUS BUSINESS by Jane Smiley (Historical Mystery)
Monterey, 1851. Ever since her husband was killed in a bar fight, Eliza Ripple has been working in a brothel. It seems like a better life, at least at first. The madam, Mrs. Parks, is kind, the men are (relatively) well behaved, and Eliza has attained what few women have: financial security. But when the dead bodies of young women start appearing outside of town, a darkness descends that she can't resist confronting. Side by side with her friend, Jean, and inspired by her reading --- especially by Edgar Allan Poe’s detective, Dupin --- Eliza pieces together an array of clues to try to catch the killer, all the while juggling clients who begin to seem more and more suspicious.
Knopf | 9780525520337
THE DRESSMAKERS OF PROSPECT HEIGHTS by Kitty Zeldis (Historical Fiction)
Brooklyn, 1924. As New York City enters the jazz age, the lives of three very different women are about to converge in unexpected ways. Recently arrived from New Orleans, Beatrice is working to establish a chic new dress shop with help from Alice, the orphaned teenage ward she brought north with her. Down the block, newlywed Catherine is restless in her elegant brownstone, longing for a baby she cannot conceive. When Bea befriends Catherine and the two start to become close, Alice feels abandoned and envious, and runs away to Manhattan. Her departure sets into motion a series of events that will force each woman to confront the painful secrets of her past in order to move into the happier future she seeks.
Harper | 9780063026346
ELIZABETH TAYLOR: The Grit & Glamour of an Icon by Kate Andersen Brower (Biography)
No celebrity rivals Elizabeth Taylor’s glamour and guts or her level of fame. In the first-ever authorized biography of the Hollywood icon, Kate Andersen Brower reveals the world through Elizabeth’s eyes. Brower uses Elizabeth’s unpublished letters, diary entries and off-the-record interview transcripts, as well as interviews with 250 of her closest friends and family, to tell the full, unvarnished story of her remarkable career and her explosive private life that made headlines worldwide. ELIZABETH TAYLOR captures this intelligent, empathetic, tenacious, volatile and complex woman as never before.
Harper | 9780063067653
EMPIRE OF ICE AND STONE: The Disastrous and Heroic Voyage of the Karluk by Buddy Levy (History)
In the summer of 1913, the wooden-hulled brigantine Karluk departed Canada for the Arctic Ocean. At the helm was Captain Bob Bartlett, considered the world’s greatest living ice navigator. The expedition’s visionary leader was a flamboyant impresario named Vilhjalmur Stefansson, who was hungry for fame. Just six weeks after the Karluk departed, giant ice floes closed in around her. As the ship became icebound, Stefansson disembarked with five companions and struck out on what he claimed was a 10-day caribou hunting trip. Most on board would never see him again. Captain Bartlett now made a difficult and courageous decision. He would take one of the young Inuit hunters and attempt a 1,000-mile journey to save the shipwrecked survivors. It was their only hope.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250274441
A GIANT WIN: Inside the New York Giants' Historic Upset Over the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLII by Tom Coughlin with Greg Hanlon (Sports)
Super Bowl XLII was the greatest upset in NFL history. In A GIANT WIN, Coach Tom Coughlin recounts the strategies and people that made it possible. He details, more than ever before, his relationships with some of the greatest, most iconic players of those Giants teams, like Eli Manning and Michael Strahan. The book also provides a frame for Coach Coughlin to discuss his life in football --- including his years with the Giants as an assistant coach in the late 1980s and 1990, when he helped win a Super Bowl working under Hall of Fame Head Coach Bill Parcells and alongside the coach he’d oppose in Super Bowl XLII: Bill Belichick.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538724644
A HARD DAY FOR A HANGOVER by Darynda Jones (Mystery/Humor)
Some people greet the day with open arms. Sheriff Sunshine Vicram would rather give it a hearty shove and get back into bed, because there’s just too much going on right now. There’s a series of women going missing, and Sunny feels powerless to stop it. There’s her persistent and awesomely rebellious daughter Auri, who’s out to singlehandedly become Del Sol’s youngest and fiercest investigator. And then there’s drama with Levi Ravinder, the guy she’s loved and lusted after for years. The guy who just might be her one and only. The guy who comes from a family of disingenuous vipers looking to oust him --- and Sunshine --- for good. Like we said, the new day can take a hike.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250233141
A HISTORY OF FEAR by Luke Dumas (Literary Thriller/Horror)
Grayson Hale, the most infamous murderer in Scotland, is better known by a different name: the Devil’s Advocate. The 25-year-old American grad student rose to instant notoriety when he confessed to the slaughter of his classmate Liam Stewart, claiming the Devil made him do it. When Hale is found hanged in his prison cell, officers uncover a handwritten manuscript that promises to answer the question that’s haunted the nation for years: Was Hale a lunatic, or had he been telling the truth all along?
Atria Books | 9781982199029
HOW FAR THE LIGHT REACHES: A Life in Ten Sea Creatures by Sabrina Imbler (Science/Essays)
A queer, mixed-race writer working in a largely white, male field, science and conservation journalist Sabrina Imbler has always been drawn to the mystery of life in the sea, and particularly to creatures living in hostile or remote environments. Each essay in their debut collection profiles one such creature: the mother octopus who starves herself while watching over her eggs, the Chinese sturgeon whose migration route has been decimated by pollution and dams, the bizarre Bobbitt worm (named after Lorena), and other uncanny creatures lurking in the deep ocean, far below where the light reaches. Imbler discovers that some of the most radical models of family, community and care can be found in the sea.
Little, Brown and Company | 9780316540537
THE INGENUE by Rachel Kapelke-Dale (Psychological Thriller)
When former piano prodigy Saskia Kreis returns home to Milwaukee after her mother's unexpected death, she expects to inherit the family estate, the Elf House. But with the discovery that her mother's will bequeathed the Elf House to a man with whom Saskia shares a complicated history, she is forced to reexamine her own past --- and the romantic relationship that changed the course of her life --- for answers. Can she find a way to claim her heritage while keeping her secrets buried, or will the fallout from digging too deep destroy her?
St. Martin's Press | 9781250834560
JUDAS 62 by Charles Cumming (Thriller)
1993: Student Lachlan Kite is sent to post-Soviet Russia, a spy in the guise of a language teacher. Embedded in the town of Voronezh, Kite’s mission is to extract a chemical weapons scientist before the man’s groundbreaking research falls into the wrong hands and shuttle him across the border to freedom in Ukraine. But Kite’s mission soon goes wrong, and he is left stranded in a hostile city with a former KGB officer on his trail. 2020: Thirty years after that dangerous mission, Kite discovers that its outcome put his name on the notorious “JUDAS” list --- a record of enemies of Russia who have been targeted for assassination. Kite’s fight for survival takes him to Dubai, where he enters into a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with the Russian secret state.
Mysterious Press | 9781613163399
THE LIGHT PIRATE by Lily Brooks-Dalton (Fiction)
As devastating weather patterns and rising sea levels wreak gradual havoc on Florida’s infrastructure, a powerful hurricane approaches a small town on the southeastern coast. Kirby Lowe, an electrical line worker; his pregnant wife, Frida; and their two sons prepare for the worst. When the boys go missing just before the hurricane hits, Kirby heads out into the high winds in search of them. Left alone, Frida goes into premature labor and gives birth to an unusual child, Wanda, whom she names after the catastrophic storm that ushers her into a society closer to collapse than ever before. As Florida continues to unravel, Wanda grows. She loses family, gains community, and seeks adventure, love and purpose in a place remade by nature.
Grand Central Publishing | 9781538708279
NIGHT SHIFT by Robin Cook (Medical Mystery/Thriller)
Colleagues turned spouses Dr. Laurie Montgomery and Dr. Jack Stapleton already have their plates full with crazy work schedules and family pressures. The last thing they need is a murder. When Laurie’s longtime friend, by all accounts healthy Dr. Sue Passero, dies mysteriously in the hospital parking garage, an autopsy is required, which falls squarely under Laurie’s purview as newly appointed chief medical examiner. So when Laurie asks Jack to take special care with the case, he can hardly refuse. What starts out as an inquiry into Sue’s tragic passing soon turns into a deadly and dangerous chess game between Jack and the clever and deranged killer, who just might administer another lethal blow if Jack isn’t careful.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780593540183
NO ONE LEFT TO COME LOOKING FOR YOU by Sam Lipsyte (Mystery/Humor)
Manhattan’s East Village, 1993. Crime is high, but rent is low, luring hopeful, creative kids from sleepy suburbs around the country. One of these is Jack S., a young New Jersey rock musician. Just a few days before his band’s biggest gig, their lead singer goes missing with Jack’s prized bass, presumably to hock it to feed his junk habit. Jack’s search for his buddy uncovers a sinister entanglement of crimes tied to local real estate barons looking to remake New York City --- and who also might be connected to the recent death of Jack’s punk rock mentor. Along the way, Jack encounters a cast of colorful characters, including a tough-talking cop who fancies himself a retro-cool icon of the homicide squad but is harboring a surprising secret.
Simon & Schuster | 9781501146121
A PRIVATE SPY: The Letters of John le Carré written by John le Carré, edited by Tim Cornwell (Literary Collection/Letters)
The never-before-seen correspondance of John le Carré, one of the most important novelists of our generation, are collected in A PRIVATE SPY. During his lifetime, le Carré wrote numerous letters to writers, spies, politicians, artists, actors and public figures. This collection is a treasure trove, revealing the late author’s humor, generosity and wit --- a side of him many readers have not previously seen.
Viking | 9780593490679
QUEENS OF THE AGE OF CHIVALRY: England's Medieval Queens, Volume Three by Alison Weir (History)
The Age of Chivalry describes a period of medieval history dominated by the social, religious and moral code of knighthood that prized noble deeds, military greatness, and the game of courtly love between aristocratic men and women. It was also a period of high drama in English history, which included the toppling of two kings, the Hundred Years War, the Black Death and the Peasants’ Revolt. Feudalism was breaking down, resulting in social and political turmoil. Against this dramatic milieu, Alison Weir describes the lives and reigns of five queen consorts: Marguerite of France, Isabella of France, Philippa of Hainault, Anne of Bohemia and Isabella of Valois.
Ballantine Books | 9781101966723
ROSES, IN THE MOUTH OF A LION by Bushra Rehman (Fiction)
Razia Mirza grows up amid the wild grape vines and backyard sunflowers of Corona, Queens, with her best friend, Saima, by her side. When a family rift drives the girls apart, Razia’s heart is broken. She finds solace in Taslima, a new girl in her close-knit Pakistani-American community. But when Razia is accepted to Stuyvesant, a prestigious high school in Manhattan, the gulf between the person she is and the daughter her parents want her to be widens. At Stuyvesant, Razia meets Angela and is attracted to her in a way that blossoms into a new understanding. When their relationship is discovered by an Aunty in the community, Razia must choose between her family and her own future.
Flatiron Books | 9781250834782
SHOWSTOPPER: A Peter Diamond Investigation by Peter Lovesey (Mystery)
In the six years since the start of the hit British TV show “Swift,” its cast and crew have been plagued by misfortune, beginning with the star actress’s pulling out of the show before it began. By now there have been multiple injuries by fall, fire or drowning; two deaths; and two missing persons cases. The media quickly decides it’s a curse, but who’s to say there isn’t a criminal conspiracy afoot? Now that the filming has moved to Bath, Peter Diamond, Chief of the Avon and Somerset Murder Squad, is on the case. While the investigation into one fatal accident is underway, a cameraman goes missing, challenging even the most credulous to wonder if he might have been the victim of foul play rather than a jinx. How can so many things go wrong on one set in such a short time?
Soho Crime | 9781641294706
STELLA MARIS by Cormac McCarthy (Fiction)
1972, Black River Falls, Wisconsin: Alicia Western, 20 years old and with $40,000 in a plastic bag, admits herself to the hospital. A doctoral candidate in mathematics at the University of Chicago, Alicia has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, and she does not want to talk about her brother, Bobby. Instead, she contemplates the nature of madness, the human insistence on one common experience of the world; she recalls a childhood where, by the age of seven, her own grandmother feared for her; she surveys the intersection of physics and philosophy. And she introduces her cohorts, her chimeras, the hallucinations that only she can see. All the while, she grieves for Bobby, who is not quite dead, not quite hers.
Knopf | 9780307269003
THREE-EDGED SWORD by Jeff Lindsay (Thriller)
Super thief Riley Wolfe can do it all. He is a master of disguise, can scale a wall, and can vanish into thin air (thick air, too). He uses these unique talents to rob the richest. But this time, it’s the most powerful who have him in their grips. It’s not just that the high-up, rogue government agent has abducted the only two people Riley loves: it’s the fact that Riley has to do the man’s dirty work to set them free. It’s something Riley ordinarily would find a modest day’s work, infiltrating a madman’s Soviet missile silo in one of the world’s most remote places, all to find a secret on a tiny flash drive. But he’s never had to race the clock like this.
Dutton | 9780593186220
TOM CLANCY RED WINTER: A Jack Ryan Novel by Marc Cameron (Thriller/Adventure)
1985. A top secret F117 aircraft crashes into the Nevada desert. The Nighthawk is the most advanced fighting machine in the world, and the Soviets will do anything to get their hands on its secrets. In East Berlin, a mysterious figure contacts the CIA with an incredible offer --- invaluable details of his government’s espionage plans in return for asylum. It’s an offer they can’t pass up...if it’s genuine. But the risks are too great to blindly stumble into a deal. With the East German secret police closing in, someone will have to go behind the Berlin Wall to investigate the potential defector. It’s a job Deputy Director James Greer can only trust to one man --- Jack Ryan. Can Ryan get the right answers before the Cold War turns into a Red Winter?
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780593422755
W. E. B. GRIFFIN THE DEVIL'S WEAPONS: A Men at War Novel by Peter Kirsanow (Historical Thriller/Adventure)
April 1940. By terms of the Soviet Nazi Nonaggression pact, the two dictatorships divided the helpless nation of Poland. Now, the Russians are rounding up enemies of the state in their occupation zone, but one essential target slips away. Dr. Sebastian Kapsky had spent years working with Walter Riedel and Werner von Braun in the early days of rocket science, but as a man with a conscience he refused to continue when he saw the perversion of their work by the Nazis. That makes him the most knowledgeable person about German superweapons outside of Germany. The Germans want him. The Soviets are desperate to grab him, but Wild Bill Donovan knows there's only one man who can find him in the middle of a war zone and get him out --- Dick Canidy.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780593422281
WE KNEW ALL ALONG by Mina Hardy (Domestic Thriller)
Jewelann Jordan has one thing on her mind when she attends her class reunion, and that's making sure her old crush, Christian Campbell, sees exactly what he lost all those years ago. A late night, a hotel room, a rekindled flame that burns even hotter than it did back then. What could go wrong? Everything. The night with Christian isn't the first secret Jewelann has kept from her husband Ken, so one more shouldn't be much harder --- except that Christian shows up without warning, seemingly determined to do his best to mess up Jewelann's life in any way he can. Worse than that, he seems to have his sights set on charming her son, Eli, and befriending her husband. Fighting to keep it all from spiraling out of control, Jewelann discovers that Christian is not the man he claims to be.
Crooked Lane Books | 9781639101405
WEIGHTLESS: Making Space for My Resilient Body and Soul by Evette Dionne (Memoir)
In WEIGHTLESS, acclaimed writer Evette Dionne explores the minefields that fat Black woman are forced to navigate in the course of everyday life. From her early experiences of harassment to adolescent self-discovery in internet chatrooms to diagnosis with heart failure at age 29, Dionne tracks her relationships with friendship, sex, motherhood, agoraphobia, health, pop culture and self-image. Along the way, she lifts back the curtain to reveal the subtle, insidious forms of surveillance and control levied at fat women. But Dionne’s unflinching account of our deeply held prejudices is matched by her fierce belief in the power of self-love.
Ecco | 9780063076365
THE WIDOWMAKER: A Black Harbor Novel by Hannah Morrissey (Mystery/Thriller)
Ever since business mogul Clive Reynolds disappeared 20 years ago, the name "Reynolds" has become synonymous with "murder" and "mystery." And now, lured by a cryptic note, down-on-her-luck photographer Morgan Mori returns home to Black Harbor and into the web of their family secrets and double lives. The same night she photographs the Reynolds holiday get-together, Morgan becomes witness to a homicide of a cop that triggers the discovery of a long-buried clue. This finally could be the thing to crack open the chilling cold case, and Investigator Ryan Hudson has a chance to prove himself as lead detective. But as Morgan exposes her own dark demons, could her sordid history be the key to unlocking more than one mystery?
Minotaur Books | 9781250795977
YOUR TABLE IS READY: Tales of a New York City Maître D' by Michael Cecchi-Azzolina (Memoir)
From his early career serving theater stars like Tennessee Williams and Dustin Hoffman at La Rousse right through to the last pre-pandemic-shutdown full houses at Le Coucou, Michel Cecchi-Azzolina has seen it all. In YOUR TABLE IS READY, he breaks down how restaurants really run (and don’t), and how the economics work for owners and overworked staff alike. The professionals who gravitate to the business are a special, tougher breed, practiced in dealing with the demanding patrons and with each other, in a very distinctive ecosystem that’s somewhere between a George Orwell “down and out in…” dungeon and a sleek showman’s smoke-and-mirrors palace.
St. Martin's Press | 9781250281982
On Sale the Week of December 5th in Paperback
December 6th
AMOK: A Dox Thriller by Barry Eisler (Thriller)
Paperback Original
1991. A restless young man called Dox is back home in Texas. His friends have missed him, and his mother and sisters need him. But after four years as a Marine and another two as a CIA contractor fighting the Soviet Union alongside the Afghan mujahideen, small-town life in Abilene is a suffocating dead end. Another secret war, this one in Southeast Asia, offers a big payday and the solution to his family’s troubles. But secret wars are never what they’re billed to be, and Dox is about to get the education of his young life. Among the lessons --- the only thing more dangerous than war is falling in love with your enemy.
Thomas & Mercer | 9781542005647
BEASTS OF A LITTLE LAND by Juhea Kim (Historical Fiction)
In 1917, deep in the snowy mountains of occupied Korea, an impoverished local hunter on the brink of starvation saves a young Japanese officer from an attacking tiger. In the aftermath, a young girl named Jade is sold by her family to Miss Silver’s courtesan school, an act of desperation that will cement her place in the lowest social status. When she befriends an orphan boy named JungHo, who scrapes together a living begging on the streets of Seoul, they form a deep friendship. As they come of age, JungHo is swept up in the revolutionary fight for independence, and Jade becomes a sought-after performer with a new romantic prospect of noble birth. Soon Jade must decide whether she will risk everything for the one who would do the same for her.
Ecco | 9780063093584
BIBLIOLEPSY by Gina Apostol (Fiction)
It is the mid-’80s, two decades into the kleptocratic, brutal rule of Ferdinand Marcos. The Philippine economy is in deep recession, and civil unrest is growing by the day. But Primi Peregrino has her own priorities: tracking down books and pursuing romantic connections with their authors. For Primi, the nascent revolution means that writers are gathering more often, and with greater urgency, so that every poetry reading she attends presents a veritable “Justice League” of authors for her to choose among. As the Marcos dictatorship stands poised to topple, Primi remains true to her fantasy: that she, “a vagabond from history, a runaway from time,” can be saved by sex, love and books.
Soho Press | 9781641294119
BOX 88 by Charles Cumming (Thriller)
Lachlan Kite is a member of BOX 88, an elite transatlantic black ops outfit so covert that not even MI6 and the CIA are certain of its existence. But even the best spy can’t anticipate every potential threat in a world where dangerous actors lurk around every corner. At the funeral of his childhood best friend, Lachlan falls into a trap that drops him into the hands of a potentially deadly interrogation, with his pregnant wife, also abducted, being held as collateral for the information he’s sworn on his own life to protect. In order to save his family, Lachlan will be forced to revisit painful memories of a special assignment from 30 years ago that allowed him special access to one of Iran’s most dangerous men.
Mysterious Press | 9781613163696
THE CIRCUS TRAIN by Amita Parikh (Historical Fiction)
Paperback Original
1938. Lena Papadopoulos has never quite found her place within the circus, even as the daughter of the extraordinary headlining illusionist, Theo. Lena, who uses a wheelchair after a childhood bout with polio, yearns for the real-world magic of science and medicine, her mind stronger than the limitations placed on her by society. Then her unconventional life takes an exciting turn when she rescues Alexandre, an orphan with his own secrets and a mysterious past. As World War II escalates around them, their friendship blossoms into something deeper while Alexandre trains as the illusionist’s apprentice. But when Theo and Alexandre are arrested and made to perform in a town for Jews set up by the Nazis, Lena is separated from everything she knows.
G.P. Putnam's Sons | 9780593539989
CURSED BUNNY: Stories written by Bora Chung, translated by Anton Hur (Fiction/Short Stories)
Paperback Original
From an author never before published in the United States, CURSED BUNNY blends horror, sci-fi, fairy tales and speculative fiction into stories that defy categorization. “The Head” follows a woman haunted by her own bodily waste. “The Embodiment” takes us into a dystopian gynecology office where a pregnant woman is told that she must find a father for her baby or face horrific consequences. Another story follows a young monster, forced into underground fight rings without knowing the force of his own power. The titular fable centers on a cursed lamp in the approachable shape of a rabbit, fit for a child’s bedroom but for its sinister capabilities.
Algonquin Books | 9781643753607
THE DARKNESS KNOWS by Arnaldur Indridason (Mystery)
A frozen body is discovered in the icy depths of Langjökull glacier, apparently that of a businessman who disappeared 30 years before. At the time, an extensive search and police investigation yielded no results --- one of the missing man’s business associates was briefly held in custody, but there wasn’t enough evidence to charge him. Now the associate is arrested again, and Konrad, the retired policeman who originally investigated the disappearance, is called back to reopen the case that has weighed on his mind for decades. When a woman approaches him with new information that she obtained from her deceased brother, progress can finally be made in solving this long-cold case.
Minotaur Books | 9781250765482
THE DEATH OF MY FATHER THE POPE: A Memoir by Obed Silva (Memoir)
Weaving between preparations for his father’s funeral and memories of life on both sides of the U.S.–Mexico border, Obed Silva chronicles his father’s alcoholism --- a lifelong love that ended only at his death at the age of 48, having poisoned himself one Carta Blanca at a time. Addiction respects no borders. The havoc Silva’s father wreaked on his family not only followed them north, where mother and son moved to escape his violent drunken rages, but would make itself felt even from the grave. With a wry cynicism; a profane, profound anger; an antic, brutally honest voice; and a hard-won classical frame of reference, Silva channels the heartbreak of mourning while wrestling with the resentment and frustration resulting from addiction.
Picador | 9781250858900
THE DEEPEST OF SECRETS: A Rockton Novel by Kelley Armstrong (Mystery)
It’s not always easy to live in the hidden town of Rockton, something Detective Casey Duncan knows firsthand. Tucked away in the Yukon wilderness, the community survives and thrives because the residents' many secrets stay just that --- secret. But what happens when these secrets start to come out? Overnight, no one is safe. Casey and her boyfriend, Sheriff Eric Dalton, need to find the culprit while protecting those who have been thrust into the spotlight. For a place built on privacy and new beginnings, Rockton isn’t handling these revelations very well. People are turning on one another, and when one of the loudest complainers turns up barely alive, it's clear that their trickster is actually a murderer.
Minotaur Books | 9781250860675
THE DICKENS BOY by Thomas Keneally (Historical Fiction)
Edward Dickens, the 10th child of England’s most famous author Charles Dickens, has consistently let his parents down. Unable to apply himself at school and adrift in life, the teenaged boy is sent to Australia in the hopes that he can make something of himself --- or at least fail out of the public eye. He soon finds himself in the remote Outback, surrounded by Aboriginals, colonials, ex-convicts, ex-soldiers and very few women. Determined to prove to his parents and, more importantly, himself that he can succeed in this vast and unfamiliar wilderness, Edward works hard at his new life amidst various livestock, bushrangers, shifty stock agents and frontier battles.
Washington Square Press | 9781982169152
LAST CIRCLE OF LOVE by Lorna Landvik (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Newly installed at All Souls Lutheran, Mallory “Pastor Pete” Peterson soon realizes that her church isn’t merely going through turbulent waters, it’s a sinking ship. With the help of five loyal members of the Naomi Circle, the young, bold minister brainstorms fundraising ideas. They all agree that the usual recipe book won’t add much to the parish coffers, but maybe one with all the ingredients on how to heat up relationships rather than casseroles will. But not everyone in the congregation is on board with this “scandalous” project. As the voices of opposition grow louder, Pastor Pete and these intrepid women will have to decide how hard they’re willing to fight for this book and the powerful stories within.
Lake Union Publishing | 9781662506260
THE LAST INVITATION by Darby Kane (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Over the last few years, prominent people have died in a series of fluke accidents and shocking suicides. There’s no apparent connection, no signs of foul play. Behind it all is a powerful group of women, the Sophie Foundation, who meet over wine and cheese to review files of men who behave very, very badly and then mete out justice. Jessa Hall jumped at the mysterious, exclusive invitation to this secret club. The invite comes when she’s at her lowest, aching for a way to take back control. After years of fighting and scratching to get ahead, she’s ready for a chance to make the “bad guys” lose. Jessa soon realizes, though, just how far she’s willing to go and how dangerous this game has become. Once in the group, it’s impossible to get out.
William Morrow Paperbacks | 9780063225565
THE MIRROR MAN: A Killer Instinct Novel written by Lars Kepler, translated by Alice Menzies (Psychological Thriller/Mystery)
Sixteen-year-old Jenny Lind is kidnapped in broad daylight on her way home from school and thrown into the back of a truck. She’s taken to a dilapidated house, where she and other girls face horrors far beyond their worst nightmares. Though they’re desperate to escape, their captor foils every one of their attempts. Five years later, Jenny’s body is found hanging in a playground. As the police are scrambling to find a lead in the scant evidence, Detective Joona Linna recognizes an eerie connection between Jenny’s murder and a death declared a suicide years before. And when another teenage girl goes missing, it becomes clear to Joona that they’re dealing with a serial killer --- and his murderous rampage may have just begun.
Vintage | 9780593315590
MURDER, SHE WROTE: KILLER ON THE COURT by Jessica Fletcher and Terrie Farley Moran (Mystery)
Jessica Fletcher is delighted when her nephew, Grady, invites her to spend a few days with his family in an oceanside New York bungalow. She packs her bags and heads down to the city, ready to spend some quality time with Grady; his wife, Donna; and their young son, Frank. But the morning after Jessica’s arrival, Donna finds her boss dead on a tennis court, and Jessica’s dreams of a relaxing visit are quashed. Everyone in the small beachside community is a suspect, and the local authorities --- headed by an old colleague of Cabot Cove sheriff Mort Metzger --- have asked that no one leave town. Will Jessica be able find a killer and salvage the rest of her trip?
Berkley | 9780593333679
MY ANNIHILATION written by Fuminori Nakamura, translated by Sam Bett (Psychological Thriller)
With MY ANNIHILATION, Fuminori Nakamura, master of literary noir, has constructed a puzzle box of a narrative in the form of a confessional diary that implicates its reader in a heinous crime. Delving relentlessly into the darkest corners of human consciousness, the novel interrogates the unspeakable thoughts all humans share that can be monstrous when brought to life, revealing with disturbing honesty the psychological motives of a killer.
Soho Crime | 9781641294072
OBSERVATIONS BY GASLIGHT: Stories from the World of Sherlock Holmes by Lyndsay Faye (Mystery/Short Stories)
OBSERVATIONS BY GASLIGHT is a thrilling volume of both new and previously published short stories and novellas narrated by those who knew the Great Detective, Sherlock Holmes. Beloved adventuress Irene Adler teams up with her former adversary in a near-deadly inquiry into a room full of eerily stopped grandfather clocks. Learn of the case that cemented the lasting friendship between Holmes and Inspector Lestrade, and of the tragic crime that haunted the Yarder into joining the police force. And witness Stanley Hopkins’ first meeting with the remote logician he idolizes, who one day will become his devoted mentor.
Mysterious Press | 9781613163672
OUT THERE: Stories by Kate Folk (Fiction/Short Stories)
With a focus on the weird and eerie forces that lurk beneath the surface of ordinary experience, Kate Folk’s debut collection is perfectly pitched to the madness of our current moment. A medical ward for a mysterious bone-melting disorder is the setting of a perilous love triangle. A curtain of void obliterates the globe at a steady pace, forcing Earth’s remaining inhabitants to decide with whom they want to spend eternity. A man fleeing personal scandal enters a codependent relationship with a house that requires a particularly demanding level of care. And in the title story, a woman in San Francisco uses dating apps to find a partner despite the threat posed by “blots,” preternaturally handsome artificial men dispatched by Russian hackers to steal data.
Random House Trade Paperbacks | 9780593231487
THE PARIS BOOKSELLER by Kerri Maher (Historical Fiction)
When bookish young American Sylvia Beach opens Shakespeare and Company on a quiet street in Paris in 1919, she has no idea that she and her new bookstore will change the course of literature itself. Shakespeare and Company is more than a bookstore and lending library: Many of the prominent writers of the Lost Generation, like Ernest Hemingway, consider it a second home. It's where some of the most important literary friendships of the 20th century are forged --- none more so than the one between Irish writer James Joyce and Sylvia herself. When Joyce's controversial novel ULYSSES is banned, Beach takes a massive risk and publishes it under the auspices of Shakespeare and Company. Doing so comes with steep costs.
Berkley | 9780593102190
SEA STATE: A Memoir by Tabitha Lasley (Memoir)
In her mid-30s and newly free from a terrible relationship, Tabitha Lasley quit her job at a London magazine, packed her bags, and poured her savings into a six-month lease on an apartment in Aberdeen, Scotland. She decided to make good on a long-deferred idea for a book about oil rigs and the men who work on them. Why oil rigs? She wanted to see what men were like with no women around. In Aberdeen, Tabitha became deeply entrenched in the world of roughnecks, a teeming subculture rich with brawls, hard labor and competition. The longer she stayed, the more she found that her presence had a destabilizing effect on the men --- and her.
Ecco | 9780063030848
SHARPE’S ASSASSIN: Richard Sharpe and the Occupation of Paris, 1815 by Bernard Cornwell (Historical Fiction)
Bernard Cornwell's iconic hero, Richard Sharpe, is dispatched to a new battleground: the maze of Paris streets, where lines blur between friend and foe. And in search of a spy, he will have to defeat a lethal assassin determined to kill his target...or die trying.
Harper Paperbacks | 9780062563279
SO LONG, CHESTER WHEELER by Catherine Ryan Hyde (Fiction)
Paperback Original
Lewis Madigan is young, gay, out of work and getting antsy when he’s roped into providing end-of-life care for his insufferable homophobic neighbor, Chester Wheeler. Lewis doesn’t need the aggravation, just the money. The only requirements: run errands, be on call, and put up with a miserable old churl no one else in Buffalo can bear. After exchanging barbs, bickering, baiting and pushing buttons, Chester hits Lewis with the big ask. Lewis can’t say no to a dying wish: drive Chester to Arizona in his rust bucket of a Winnebago to see his ex-wife for the first time in 32 years --- for the last time. To Lewis, it becomes an illuminating journey into the life and secrets of a vulnerable man he’s finally beginning to understand.
Lake Union Publishing | 9781542021593
THINGS WE FOUND WHEN THE WATER WENT DOWN by Tegan Nia Swanson (Mystery/Magicial Realism)
Paperback Original
When brutish miner Hugo Mitchum is found murdered on the frozen shore of a North Country lake, the local officials and town gossips of Beau Caelais are quick to blame Marietta Abernathy, an outspoken environmental activist and angry, witchy recluse. But Marietta herself has disappeared under mysterious circumstances. Living on an isolated island with her father, Marietta’s 16-year-old daughter, Lena, begins sifting through her mother’s journals and collected oddities in an attempt to find her. While her father’s grief threatens to consume him and her adoptive aunt Bea reckons with guilt and acceptance, it is the haunting town outcast Ellis Olsen who might have the most to lose if Lena fails to find her mother.
Catapult | 9781646221691
THE VIOLIN CONSPIRACY by Brendan Slocumb (Mystery/Thriller)
Growing up Black in rural North Carolina, Ray McMillian’s life is already mapped out. But Ray has a gift and a dream --- he’s determined to become a world-class professional violinist, and nothing will stand in his way. When he discovers that his beat-up family fiddle is actually a priceless Stradivarius, all his dreams suddenly seem within reach. Together, Ray and his violin take the world by storm. But on the eve of the renowned and cutthroat Tchaikovsky Competition, the violin is stolen, a ransom note for five million dollars left in its place. Without it, Ray feels like he's lost a piece of himself. As the competition approaches, Ray not only must reclaim his precious violin, he must prove to himself --- and the world --- that no matter the outcome, there has always been a truly great musician within him.
Vintage | 9780593315422
WE KNOW YOU REMEMBER by Tove Alsterdal (Mystery)
It’s been more than 20 years since Olof Hagström left home. Returning to his family’s house, he knows instantly that something is amiss. The front door key, hidden under a familiar stone, is still there. Inside, there’s a panicked dog, a terrible stench and water pooling on the floor: the father Olaf has not seen or spoken to in decades is dead in the bathroom shower. For police detective Eira Sjödin, the investigation of this suspicious death resurrects long-forgotten nightmares. She was only nine when Olof Hagström, then 14, was found guilty of raping and murdering a local girl. The case left a mark on the town’s collective memory and tinged Eira’s childhood with fear. Too young to be sentenced, Olof was sent to a youth home and exiled from his family. He was never seen in the town again. Until now.
Harper Paperbacks | 9780063115071
WELL TRAVELED by Jen DeLuca (Romantic Comedy)
Paperback Original
Louisa "Lulu" Malone is a high-powered attorney from a success-oriented family. Her cousin, Mitch, introduced her to the world of Renaissance Faires, and when she spies one at a time just when she needs an escape, she leaps into the welcoming environment of turkey legs, taverns and tarot readers. The only drawback? Dex MacLean: a guitarist with a killer smile, the Casanova of the Faire…and her traveling companion for the summer. Dex has never had to work for much in his life. Touring with his brothers as The Dueling Kilts is going great, and he always finds a woman at every Faire. But when Lulu proves indifferent to his many plaid charms and a shakeup threatens the fate of the band, Dex must confront something he never has before: his future.
Berkley | 9780593200469
THE WOMEN I LOVE written by Francesco Pacifico, translated by Elizabeth Harris (Fiction)
Marcello, an editor and poet, is on the brink of his 40s. Like everyone in his life, including his sister-in-law, he’s writing a novel. This novel. This novel will be about women. Love. Growing older. Maybe even taking responsibility. But unfortunately for Marcello, the women in his life resist definition. They flit and flicker constantly between archetype and actuality: sirens and saviors, subordinates and savants, vixens and villains. So Marcello cannot write plainly about love. Instead, he tries to write into the complexities of his many relationships: Eleonora, the junior editor, his former protegeé and sometime lover; Barbara, his claustrophobic girlfriend; his estranged gay sister; and his elegant mother.
Picador | 9781250858771
YOU NEVER SAID GOODBYE by Luca Veste (Psychological Thriller)
Paperback Original
Sam Cooper is on the verge of a happy life --- a true feat after his disastrous childhood. Sam's mother, Laurie, died tragically and his father was torn apart by grief. But now, after years of silence, Sam's father makes a shocking confession on his deathbed. Who was Laurie Cooper? What happens when you discover you've been lied to for 25 years? Sam is determined to find out, but someone wants to silence the truth forever. Following a trail from London to Connecticut, Sam will have to uncover exactly what his mother did and why --- no matter the cost.
Sourcebooks Landmark | 9781728261294
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